Installing MSSQL 2017 Developer Edition on my relatively clean development VM today I was getting an error part way through the installation:

Error installing Microsoft Visual C++ 2015 Redistributable
VS Shell installation has failed with exit code 1638.

The installer then continued, but at the end I was told that the Database Engine and a couple of other components were not installed correctly.

I tried downloading a newer MSSQL installer, but that still didn’t work.

I tried installing the Microsoft Visual C++ 2013 Redistributable (per several suggestions from others).  That made no difference.

In the end it boiled down to the fact that I already had Visual Studio 2017 installed and that had installed the Microsoft Visual C++ 2017 Redistributable.  I ended up having to remove the Microsoft Visual C++ 2017 Redistributable component using Windows Add/Remove Programs (being sure to uninstall both the x86 and x64 versions).

After a reboot for good measure, the MSSQL 2017 installer ran fine.

I then went back and re-installed the Microsoft Visual C++ 2017 Redistributable x86 and x64 components using the following links:

• https://download.microsoft.com/download/1/f/e/1febbdb2-aded-4e14-9063-39fb17e88444/vc_redist.x86.exe
• https://download.microsoft.com/download/3/b/f/3bf6e759-c555-4595-8973-86b7b4312927/vc_redist.x64.exe

And fired up Visual Studio 2017.